How do I decide if my Pokémon is good?

This is a massive question, and it's the main reason DialgaDex exists. There are plenty of factors that go into determining which Pokémon are good in raids, and many of these factors aren't visible at all in-game. Here are a few ways of evaluating your Pokémon using the tools available on this website.

First and foremost, anything in the higher tiers of the overall "All-type" attacker ranking is obviously going to be useful. These are some of the absolute strongest Pokémon in the game, many of which are so powerful that you could use them to some degree of success regardless of the context (weather, party size, type effectiveness). These so-called "generalists" are always valuable, and only grow more powerful in the specific niches where they shine brightest.

You can also go to your Pokémon's PokéDex page (either by clicking on the Pokémon or searching for them at the top of the page). There, your Pokémon's tier rankings are listed for all of its attack types (including attacks that don't even match the Pokémon's types.)

You can also consult the "type" rankings for each type of your Pokémon. For example, if you're evaluating Garchomp you should consider both the Ground-type and Dragon-type rankings to see how valuable he is in each situation.

As an alternative, you can (and usually should) consider the "counter" rankings for types that are weak against your Pokémon. To continue our example, a Ground-type like Garchomp will show up on the Steel-counters ranking. These lists are especially valuable because they help capture the overlap between different types. While Garchomp is a very good Ground-type, he has strong competition from Fighting- and Fire-types when facing Steel-type raid bosses. These "counter" rankings are one of the best ways to cross-reference all the different ranking lists in one place.

To access the "counter" rankings for a type, go to that type's attacker ranking list (click on "Attacker Rankings" in the dropdown menu in the site header, then select the type at the top of the page). From there, click on the highlighted "Attackers" button in the header to toggle from "Strongest X-type Attackers" to "Strongest X-type Counters."

(Can't remember what types your Pokémon is good against? Use the Type Chart to quickly find out! Clicking on any of the attacking types (left side of the table) will bring you to that type's ranking. Clicking on any of the defending types (top of the table) will bring you to that type's "counters" ranking.)

What should I use to compare two Pokémon's rankings?

While the exact eDPS for each Pokémon is the most accurate point of comparison, it can be a little misleading. eDPS is a stand-in for real world results, and it implies more precision than it can actually achieve, as real raids are full of volatile, random probabilities. For this reason, DialgaDex assigns each ranking result a "tier" level. Any Pokémon in the same tier are likely to perform relatively similarly in the real world. Within any one tier, IVs, boss movesets, unique tempo and energy interactions, and plain random chance are going to take over. So Pokémon should be judged primarily by where they appear in these "tiers", not their exact position in the ranking. There's nothing magical about placing one Pokémon at rank 9 and another at rank 10 if both of them have very similar eDPS (say, within about ~5% of each other).

How do I find the best moveset for my Pokémon?

On your Pokémon's PokéDex page, the "movesets" area shows the strength of each of it's movesets. Both the fast and charged move are important, as they each depend on the other to perform optimally. Some charged moves want to be paired with fast moves that generate a lot of energy, while others are okay being combined with fast moves that prioritize damage. Make sure to TM both moves onto your Pokémon, as they only work properly when combined properly.

This area only gives the best moves against a generic stand-in enemy, with no super-effective type bonuses being applied. Usually you'll want your moves to both be super-effective against whatever boss you're facing, so prioritize movesets where both types match.

You can also look up your Pokémon in the various ranking lists to see what moveset is recommended. If you know the specific raid boss you'll be facing, you can also check that boss's counters (preferrably using a simulator) to see what movesets are best against that boss.

How do I decide if my Pokémon has good enough IVs ("Appraisal")?

In order to check how your specific Pokémon's IVs stack up, go to the "Stats, IVs, and CP" area on its PokéDex page. There you can enter your exact IVs and level. When you click "Calculate", the "Effective Stats" of your Pokémon will be displayed, as well as a comparison between your Pokémon and a perfect "hundo" at the same level. The most important stat to look at is "Percent of Perfect eDPS", which represents the performance difference in real raids. (You'll notice that this also updates the "movesets" area with real DPS values for your specific Pokémon.)

IVs are usually overemphasized by the Pokémon Go community. In order, usually it's most important to have the best Pokémon species, then second most important to have the correct moves, then least important to have the best IVs.

In most circumstances, a perfect 15/15/15 IV Pokémon is only going to be 5-10% better than the very worst 0/0/0 IV version of that same species and moveset. Most worthwhile attackers are also obtained from raids, which guarantee at least 10/10/10 minimum IVs. The difference between this "minimum" raid-reward Pokémon and a "hundo" is usually more like 3%. So while you should generally prioritize the highest-IV Pokémon you have (especially the attack IV, which is the most relevant for raids), the difference usually isn't significant enough to fret over.

Similarly, even the very worst 0/0/0 IV shadow version of a Pokémon is usually around 5% better than a "hundo" of the non-shadow version. This means any shadow Pokémon is usually an upgrade over its pure form. Do not purify a shadow Pokémon to use in raids. The only except is purifying it in order to have a high-IV Pokémon to Mega-evolve. Even in this scenario, usually it's better to hold on to the shadow version, which will be useful on its own, and find a different already-pure Pokémon to Mega-evolve instead.

How can I tweak the parameters used in these calculations?

Most of the calculation settings are available in the settings dropdown in the site header. This is where you can set the parameters in the eDPS formula: Raid Team Size and Relobby Time. It also allows you to enable party power, including customizing how many players are in your party raiding together.

These settings apply site-wide and affect all calculations found on both the PokéDex pages and the ranking lists.

What if I don't have the top Pokémon - how do I find "budget" options?

Whether it's a lack of stardust and candy, lack of Elite TMs, having missed a time-limited raid/event/research, etc. there are many reasons why you might not be able to access the very best of the best attackers. The settings for the ranking lists (and "counters" list on a boss's PokéDex page) have some helpful tools for finding more accessible replacements.

The biggest tool is the Species filter, which allows you to remove Mega, shadow, and legendary Pokémon. Most of the remaining attackers are reasonably available. Often they'll be a rarer spawn, typically something featured in an event, but they're reasonably likely to be available as a wild catch right now. Many of these Pokémon are still very good options, even if they're a clear tier or two below the top. Target these while you wait to have the resources or access to better Pokémon. At that point, they'll still be useful for filling out the rest of your raid team.

There are also useful Move Filters. If you're looking for true "budget" picks, you can disable Elite Moves to find Pokémon whose movesets won't require an Elite TM. Often these are the same species, just with slightly worse moves. In order to compare how much of a difference the Elite TM would make, you can enable "Suboptimal Moves." This will show up to the top 5 movesets per species, and the performance of those worse moves as compared to the very best moveset for that species.

You can also increase the length of the table with the "Row Count" settings, allowing you to see more Pokémon and movesets. While Pokémon further down the list will naturally be worse, usually their performance drops off pretty slowly. For example, the gap between the #1 best Fire-type attacker and the 20th best Fire-attacker is roughly the same as the gap to the 90th best, meaning there are many roughly-equivalent options in the lower tiers.

What are the "Tiers" and "Baseline" settings doing?

The "Tiers" setting determines how Pokémon get grouped into the different tier rankings. Everything on DialgaDex is calculated dynamically (in fact, it's all calculated directly in your web browser), and tiers are no exception. This helps remove bias from the tier-making process. Still, there are a few different ways of building tiers, each with its own motivation and advantages.

The Jenks and ESpace methods both rely on choosing a reference "Baseline" Pokémon as a point of comparison. This Pokémon is placed around the A-tier, then all other Pokémon are ranked relative to it. There are different ways of selecting this "Baseline." The default "Budget" method looks for the best highly-available option (which excludes things like Megas, shadows, and legendaries). The ESpace method - which is designed to be used alongside the ESpace tiers option - looks for the best reasonably-available option (which excludes most limited Pokémon but includes things like most shadows and most legendaries). The "Best" method just picks the very best option, without any further filtering.

From here, the tier-making setting takes over. "Jenks" uses an optimization algorithm to find the best places to split the results into a new tier. It is sometimes called the "Natural Breaks" algorithm, because it tries to place these splits where there are already gaps in the data, very similar to how a human would "naturally" define a tier-break if they were doing it by hand. "ESpace" uses a strict rule that every tier should be 10% wide, meaning A-tier would contain everything from 5% worse to 5% better than the reference Pokémon, B-tier would be from 15% worse to 5% worse, and so on.

"Absolute" tier-making is slightly different. Instead of looking at the context and always searching for a new point of reference, it has defined "absolute" breakpoints for what eDPS values correspond to which tiers. This makes it very effective for comparing performance across multiple different type rankings (exposing, for instance, that even the very best Poison types are still very weak relative to other types). However, this lacks context - in the rare case where you need a Poison type, even an otherwise-mediocre option will look S-tier.

Why isn't there a setting to see the best counters against two types?

Generally speaking, very few Pokémon (and even fewer high-difficulty raid bosses worth considering) share a dual-type combination. At the point where you're looking to find the best counters against a specific type combination, you're probably looking to find the best counters against a specific raid boss. If you're looking for counters against a specific raid boss, you should go there directly instead of checking a generic ranking list, because other factors like the boss's stats and movesets become important.

For example, if you're looking to find the best counters against a Ground/Fire-type, you're probably actually looking for the best counters against Primal Groudon. In that case, it's important to know that Groudon has access to Solar Beam, which means Water-type counters generally underperform against it (compared to normal rankings) and certain Pokémon like Golisopod are uniquely equipped against it (due to Bug's helpful resistance to both Grass- and Ground-type damage).

Why aren't my settings saved between visits?

This feature is on the roadmap, but has not yet been released.

What is eDPS?

eDPS is short for "Effective" DPS. It is calculated using a combination of TDO and DPS, and represents the actual long-term DPS a Pokémon is expected to do. It accounts for the time wasted dying and relobbying, time during which no damage is being done. It should be considered the successor to previous performance metrics like ER, EER, and TER.

For more details about eDPS, check out the original article outlining the measure, its motivation, and its advantages over existing metrics.

How is DPS calculated?

DPS and TDO are calculated using the Comprehensive DPS Formula. DialgaDex has some tweaks to the original formula, including:

• A new formula for estimating y (incoming DPS from the raid boss) more accurately
• An updated (higher) "generic" value for y based on results from this new formula and cross-referenced against simulations
• A new formula for estimating x (energy wasted upon death) more accurately by taking into account the energy gained and wasted in the final "killing blow"

How is Party Power calculated?

In Pokémon Go, party power will double the damage of the next charged attack after it gets activated. Party power build based on the number of fast attacks you personally use, regardless of what your party members are doing. The number of fast attacks required to fully build party power depends on the size of your party: 18 attacks for a duo, 9 for a trio, and 6 for a quad. In order to best utilize party power, you want your ratio of fast-to-charged attacks to perfectly match these values. This prevents any extra fast moves being required to fully charge a charged move when party power is already active, and prevents any extra fast moves being required to fully build party power when a charged move is already charged.

The Comprehensive DPS Formula already calculates a Pokémon's expected number of fast and charged attacks. From there, we can compare this ratio against the desired optimal ratio to see how frequently party power will be active and boosting charged move damage. (This method is rough and only applies in the long-term, e.g. over the span of an entire raid. If the opposing raid boss is known, then exact interactions with incoming damage are best captured using a simulator.)

Why don't these metrics match other websites?

DialgaDex uses the latest, most up-to-date calculation methods possible. While the basic formula for calculating DPS and TDO is very similar, this site incorporates multiple tweaks to improve on the original work.

The most notable change involves incoming damage from raid bosses. Old calculations significantly underestimated how quickly your Pokémon would die. This had a ripple effect, resulting in poor estimates for wasted energy. DialgaDex uses an updated method for estimating incoming damage from bosses, which results in about a 50% higher final value. Ultimately, this means "glass cannons" (high DPS, frail Pokémon) are typically lower rated on this website.

An additional change further improves the estimate for wasted energy. By recognizing that energy waste includes both the energy you had when you died and the energy you received from the final "killing blow," DialgaDex calculates lower overall energy efficiency. This especially penalizes movesets with energy-hungry 1-bar attacks.

DialgaDex is also the only website currently using the latest metric, eDPS. This metric reflects real game mechanics instead of relying on statistical modeling. It can handle new scenarios like "solos" (fighting with just a single attacker). And it has been validated against simulations as more accurate than any previous metrics.

Why doesn't the list of counters match simulations?

While DPS calculations are fairly accurate, they still have their limits. There are some nuances related to the tempo of attacks (from both your team and the raid boss) which cannot be fully captured by our DPS formula. For this reason, DialgaDex is best used to gauge the overall effectiveness of your Pokémon instead of the performance against any one specific raid boss.

For the most accurate list of raid counters, please consult PokéBattler instead.

Why don't the values shown in the ranking tables match the ones in the PokéDex?

For most of the rankings (anything besides the overall "All" types and "Each" type lists), the DPS calculation includes a super-effective type multiplier. For example, the Fire-type attackers list applies a 1.6x damage multiplier for Fire-type attacks. The Fire-type counters list applies a 1.6x damage multiplier for Water-, Rock-, and Ground-type attacks (everything super-effective against a Fire-type Pokémon).

For overall rankings and PokéDex pages, there is no super-effective multiplier. DPS is calculated as if you were fighting a completely typeless enemy.

Note that quirks of the damage formula in Pokémon Go mean that a 1.6x super-effective multiplier isn't the same as a 1.6x multiplier on damage. The values in one area will be roughly 1.6x those in the other area, but the exact ratio is usually closer to 1.5-1.59x

Why aren't any of my modifications saved?

Each time the page is loaded, all game data (species, moves, stats, etc.) are freshly loaded from the Game Master. Any modifications you make will only be active in this same window. If you navigate away from the website (or open a new tab, or refresh the page), all the game data is reloaded and your modifications will be lost.

DialgaDex is designed to always keep you in the same session while using the website so your modifications aren't lost during normal browsing.

How do I add new moves to a Pokémon?

On the Pokémon's dex page, scroll to the "movesets" area. In the header, you can press the Edit (pencil) button to open the learnset editor.

To add a new move, go to the correct area (fast or charged move) and start typing the name of the move you're looking for into the search box, then select it from the displayed options.

To delete a move (either from the Pokémon's real learnset, or a move you added), find it in the current move list and press the red X to delete it.

How do I release the shadow version of a Pokémon?

On the Pokémon's dex page, scroll to the top where you find the Pokémon's name and image. Next to the Pokémon's name is a purple, flame-like "Shadow" icon. Clicking on this icon will toggle whether the shadow version of this species/form has been released.

How do I add a new move that doesn't yet exist in the Game Master?

This feature is on the roadmap, but has not yet been released.

How do I add a new species that doesn't yet exist in the Game Master, or add stats for a species currently missing them?

This feature is on the roadmap, but has not yet been released.

Why doesn't _______ do _______?

Sometimes there's a good reason a feature isn't implemented - a few of these are already explained elsewhere in this FAQ. But often, the real reason is "because nobody has suggested it yet." Development is still active, so if you have a new idea or find something that isn't behaving correctly, please reach out via one of the methods listed in the "About" page.